Hello Folks, Posting on behalf of a friend/colleague was recently impacted in LR and doesn't have an Blind account. She was Senior Product Manager (L5 equivalent) in WebEx team. She is interviewing at Upstart and finished the recruiter and hiring manager screen. The recruiter asked her for desired comp. One of the things the recruiter shared was Upstart has performance based yearly stock refreshers but didn't provide a range. Can someone shed some light on how much yearly refreshers are given to Sr PM (L5 equivalent) and Group Product Manager (L6 ??) assuming middle of the band performance rating, i.e. nothing super great, nothing super bad, basically meets all expectations. #upstart #pm
Thanks @2.5Bananas. I have some follow up questions : 1) Lets say they offer initial equity of 420K vesting over 4 years, i.e. $105K/yr. Based on what you said (correct me if I misunderstood) : Year 1 : $105K (original equity) Year 2 : $105K (original equity) + $105K (refresher of Year 2 based on Year 1 performance, entire of which will vest by end of Year 2) Year 3 : $105K (original equity) + $105K (refresher of Year 3 based on Year 2 performance, entire of which will vest by end of Year 3) Year 4 : $105K (original equity) + $105K (refresher of Year 4 based on Year 3 performance, entire of which will vest by end of Year 4) Year 5 : $105K (refresher of Year 5 based on Year 4 performance, entire of which will vest by end of Year 5) 2) What range for initial equity, base, bonus (15% for Sr PM, 20% for GPM?) should she expect for Sr PM (L5) and GPM (L6)? 3) Does Upstart offer Mega Backdoor IRA like I guess G, FB, MSFT and few others offer? 4) How would you rate PM org @ Upstart? people? culture? exciting/challenging work? wlb?
1. No, that's not right. It's always a one-year grant for pretty far in the future. So like this: Year 1 : $105K (original equity) Year 2 : $105K (original equity) Year 3 : $105K (original equity) Year 4 : $105K (original equity) Year 5 : $105K (refresher of Year 5 based on Year 1/2 performance) Year 6 : $105K (refresher of Year 6 based on Year 2/3 performance) 2. I'm not really sure about PM comp. I know there are already threads on eng comp. I would basically just be guessing based off of that. 3. No mega backdoor IRA. We've pretty recently gotten an HR department that is larger than 0.5 people, and people have been demanding this, so I'm hopeful. We do have an ESPP which is kinda nice. I think it's worth about $4500/year even if the stock goes down or stays flat. 4. Our product is cool and there are lots of improvements to be made still. You maybe wouldn't think that--it's just a loan, right?--but it's actually very complicated and we have so many things that we could be doing. I have mixed experiences with the PM org, especially in San Mateo. Engineers are stretched pretty thin, though we are hiring and a very rapid rate, and there is a lack of senior people. So in some ways not that great, but in some ways a good opportunity for a senior person. Culture is pretty good--pleasant place to work for the most part. There is no pressure to work long hours, but I do thing people find it easy to pressure themselves into working somewhat long hours just because there are so many things that someone obviously should be doing that don't have people to do them.
@2.5Bananas - I have a question about the upstart comp and other details, can I DM?
This is super helpful. Thanks a lot @2.5Bananas
What team specifically are they interviewing for? The culture depends a lot on the product you are working on.
What do you think about ML org? Currently interviewing there. Interested in eng and PM culture, overall feedback.
Would you be willing to make an Upstart referral? I'd DM you but I'm out for the month.
Upstart refreshers are tacked onto the end. So if you're hired with 100k/year in equity, after a year and a half, you'll get 100k over one year that starts vesting immediately after the original grant ends. Then the next year, you'll get another 100k, 1 year tacked on after that second grant ends. And so on. If you have good performance, maybe you'll get 110 or 120. It doesn't increase your TC, though I guess the nice thing is, you always have a full vesting schedule to 3 or 4 years out (depending on exactly what time of year you join), so you get a decent amount of time for appreciation.
Thank you for sharing so much! What do you think about ML org? Currently interviewing there. Interested in eng and PM cultures, and overall feedback for ML org.
Would you be willing to make an Upstart referral? I'd DM you but I'm out for the month.